Читать книгу A Letter on the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Addressed to the freeholders and other inhabitants of Yorkshire онлайн

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Sources of supply continued.

Administration of justice.

But the Slave Trade is not sustained exclusively by acts of hostile outrage. The administration of justice is turned into another engine for its supply. The punishments, as we are told by some of the old writers,^[6] were formerly remarkable for their lenity; but by degrees, they have been moulded, especially on the coast, into a more productive form. The most trifling offences are punished by the fine of one or more Slaves, which if the culprit be unable to pay, he himself is to be sold into slavery, often for the benefit of the very judges by whom he is condemned.^[7] When the necessity for obtaining Slaves becomes more pressing, new crimes are fabricated, accusations and convictions are multiplied; the unwary are artfully seduced into the commission of crimes. The imaginary offence of witchcraft becomes often a copious source of supply, a conviction being punished by the sale of the whole family.

Native superstitions: Witchcraft.